Darkthrone has been one of my favorite bands for quite some time, probably since I first heard TH and ABitNS. Oh, and Soulside Journey. Pretty amazing that, as someone in this thread said, they've made at least two of my favorite black metal albums and one of my favorite death metal albums. I've been watching their metamorphosis over the last four releases with a combination of amusement and genuine enjoyment, but I can't deny that they've become the musical embodiment of one of my least favorite trends: the posturing over the "death of true metal," and the weirdly conservative distaste for metal's evolution since 1986 or so. I suppose I'll always be along for the ride, but I have to wonder if Fenriz, and those who share his mindset, realize how they're mirroring the much maligned black metal elitism that precipitated this whole outlook.

Haha, the full song is actually 14 minutes long? Let's face it, it's going to sound like a bunch of different songs cut and pasted together. The clip they posted already sounds disjointed.

This is the only gripe I have with the preview posted. It sounds like two songs pasted together, as you say.

Come on guys, it's HALF the song missing. Songs with different middle parts aren't new. 14 minutes song rarely go on for 14 minutes of verse-chorus-verse-chorus, something like this is to be expected. That, or they'd go a totally different musical direction they'd obviously never follow now.

I love this shit. I wasn't expecting it to sound quite like this, to be honest, at least the first half. That's more overtly "speed metal" they've ever gone. It does sound a tad generic, but the riffs are still good enough and the vocals rule. I love it. This album is going to be fun as fuck. One thing I will say about Darkthrone, though. I think the fandom maybe goes beyond the music a bit, as there is a tad of a "cult of personality" around them, Fenriz especially. I don't think it's a bad thing, I just think a lot of people relate to Fenriz and NC as cool guys with good taste in music which adds to the listening experience.

Remember how "Kathaarian Life Code" from A Blaze in the Northern Sky had a bunch of noticeably different parts in its ten minute course? That song blows so much asshole it's not even funny lol.

Huh, Kathaarian Life Code is easily one of my favourite Darkthrone songs.

Yeah, it's one of my favorite songs by them. My sarcasm in my first line was to point out that most longer songs can have a lot of different individual sounding sections be it "The Melody of the Death Mask", be it "Crimson", be it "Annihilation of the Wicked", be it whatever.

Certainly, I much prefer dividing songs into several tracks if they clearly consist of several parts. Like was done on Edge of Sanity - Crimson II and Manilla Road - Atlantis Rising, and not how the original Crimson was done - one hellishly long track. This is for two reasons, mainly. Firstly, navigation. Finding that one part you wanted to hear just then is incredibly hard with albums like Crimson, whereas on Crimson II I can just go and listen to Covenant of Souls if I feel like it. Secondly, analysing the structure of the album is considerably easier if its divided to parts.

These are examples of entire albums consisting of canonical material, but this applies to stuff like Opeth aswell. I really don't like how some extremely long tracks clearly consist of two, even three obviously separate musical entities that have nothing more in common with each other than any of the other songs on the album. In Opeth's case, these songs are far, far less alike than separate movements on Crimson, for example, where later parts make allusions the earlier ones or outright repeat them. It'd be especially important for Opeth to divide the songs to more tracks as the majority of their material is drivel. It would make returning to the individual good parts easier, and occasionally even make me listen to some Opeth.

Crimson is something of a borderline case here, as its progress is very logical. Still, I'd much prefer it to be divided into several parts.

_________________"A glimpse of light is all that it takes to illuminate the darkness."

Whilst I have enjoyed the majority of their later output (dare I say more than their earlier works), I still find it facetious.

Especially when you take a look at Fenriz's BotW palaver.

Darkthrone has been quite facetious for the last couple of albums. I'd say there has been a sense of self-irony in nearly all their works (most notably excluding Transilvanian Hunger and Panzerfaust), but in tandem with their increasing punk influence (and, with Circle the Wagons, beyond the punk sound) it has been growing into outright parody.

_________________"A glimpse of light is all that it takes to illuminate the darkness."

It comes out on my birthday, so if it blows chunks I'm gonna go Hulk all over Norway

_________________Are you looking for the best Guitar Lessons in Etobicoke? With the right teaching and coaching you can indeed become the guitar player you’ve always wanted to be. Let Ryan Mueller show you how.

Why do people assume my/others' criticism towards this is caused by it not being black metal, coming from one of most important BM artists?

Fact is, if you were able to look at this objectively, you would see nothing more than second grade 80's worship at best, which is not so shameful itself (and could even be enjoyable without having bad taste), but in the light of extreme (positive) hype and knowledge what musicians responsible for this are capable of doing, I'm obviously shit talking it more than if it was random debut band from somewhere in Scandinavia.

Why do people assume my/others' criticism towards this is caused by it not being black metal, coming from one of most important BM artists?

Fact is, if you were able to look at this objectively, you would see nothing more than second grade 80's worship at best, which is not so shameful itself (and could even be enjoyable without having bad taste), but in the light of extreme (positive) hype and knowledge what musicians responsible for this are capable of doing, I'm obviously shit talking it more than if it was random debut band from somewhere in Scandinavia.

Haha, objectively? What is "objectively"? You can pretty much say anything about music and put that word in front of it, and unless you're talking about what kinds of instruments were used or what year it came out, you're always going to look stupid. 80s worship, yes, but "second grade" is definitely NOT objective, and I recommend you go look up what that word means again before you come in here and try to look superior.

Why do people assume my/others' criticism towards this is caused by it not being black metal, coming from one of most important BM artists?

Fact is, if you were able to look at this objectively, you would see nothing more than second grade 80's worship at best, which is not so shameful itself (and could even be enjoyable without having bad taste), but in the light of extreme (positive) hype and knowledge what musicians responsible for this are capable of doing, I'm obviously shit talking it more than if it was random debut band from somewhere in Scandinavia.

You aren't going to change anyone's ears, dude. You aren't going to convince anyone to all of a sudden hate the song and join your side. Don't get me wrong, I'm sure it's a great side to be on...

If one were to say the opposite, that this is objectively first grade, you'd have two contrasting opinions about the same subject matter that are both apparently factually right. When that happens, someone fucks the space-time continuum in the ass and daemons enter our reality.

I really liked Circle the Wagons, its probably the best Darkthrone has done in a while in my ears. They haven't done a six song set in a long while, so this will be interesting.

This is the only gripe I have with the preview posted. It sounds like two songs pasted together, as you say.

Come on guys, it's HALF the song missing. Songs with different middle parts aren't new. 14 minutes song rarely go on for 14 minutes of verse-chorus-verse-chorus, something like this is to be expected. That, or they'd go a totally different musical direction they'd obviously never follow now.

The transitioning in that preview sample is just not that great imo. Not Opeth bad, but it could still be better.

Darkthrone has been one of my favorite bands for quite some time, probably since I first heard TH and ABitNS. Oh, and Soulside Journey. Pretty amazing that, as someone in this thread said, they've made at least two of my favorite black metal albums and one of my favorite death metal albums. I've been watching their metamorphosis over the last four releases with a combination of amusement and genuine enjoyment, but I can't deny that they've become the musical embodiment of one of my least favorite trends: the posturing over the "death of true metal," and the weirdly conservative distaste for metal's evolution since 1986 or so. I suppose I'll always be along for the ride, but I have to wonder if Fenriz, and those who share his mindset, realize how they're mirroring the much maligned black metal elitism that precipitated this whole outlook.

I don't see it that way. I see it as a band who are old within the confines of metal continuing to mature and be more confident as artists. Darkthrone started as SERIOUS death metal, and then became MORE SERIOUS black metal, and slowly they've worked away from that to the point now where they've gone into making, yes, 80s worship metal. Good 80s worship metal, IMO, but that's what they do. It is a very slow progression going all the way back to the beginning with the way to the 90s IMO as far as the production starting to sound different, the amount of clean vocals Fenriz uses on any given record, etc etc etc. Is he conservative and holds more tightly to that music which he was exposed to as a young developing kid? Well, yeah. That makes him basically like everyone else in the world. You can't hold a 41 year old man to the standards of needing to be impressed or equally interested in the "advancement" of metal to an 18 year old who has little reasonable experience with the music and is prodigiously learning. Outside the M-A bubble there'd be plenty of people saying that about the posters here in regards to stuff like djent.

_________________"It's not some safe thing like Fugazi where everyone sits down and eats their tofu and goes 'wow man, that's revolutionary' " - Jerry A of Poison Idea

Honestly, I'm liking each of Darkthrone's latest releases more and more than the previous one--looks like this trend will continue with this upcoming album and I'm pretty thrilled with that. For whatever it's worth, this is coming from someone who otherwise holds Soulside Journey as one of their finest achievements and who regards them as one of the few post-80s black metal bands that still pass (and exceed) muster.

I Just listened to it about 5 times in a row and after about the 3rd listen I was just sitting there with this dumb grin on my face during the speed metally bits, which rule. The entire song is great as well the Celtic Frost-isms are nice and I think the transition to them was almost flawless.

I don't get how people would think this is such a huge change for the band...I mean sure, they've never sounded so blatantly like Exciter as they do in the first half of that clip, but the rest of the thing sounds like classic Darkthrone, pretty much...

Still, more people coming to the fold is a good thing!

_________________Hush! and harkTo the sorrowful cryOf the wind in the dark.Hush and hark, without murmur or sigh,To shoon that tread the lost aeons:To the sound that bids you to die.

I don't get how people would think this is such a huge change for the band...I mean sure, they've never sounded so blatantly like Exciter as they do in the first half of that clip, but the rest of the thing sounds like classic Darkthrone, pretty much...

Just pre-ordered the album yesterday! I'm hearing all the nay-Sayers and I can understand your apprehension and dislike but I for one love the new direction for Darkthrone and can't wait to get my hands on this album! Hopefully they don't run out of patches though

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iamntbatman wrote:

As a mature adult with refined tastes, I'm now smart enough to know that riffs are god, metal rules and hail satan.

Eh, you know what they say, opinions are like assholes, we all got one. I'm not saying it's the best song in the world but I do like it alot...alot. But ofcourse this is all subjective, we all like different things.

_________________

iamntbatman wrote:

As a mature adult with refined tastes, I'm now smart enough to know that riffs are god, metal rules and hail satan.